Capt. John Fairfield IV

     Capt. John Fairfield IV was baptized on 17 March 1706 in Wenham, Essex County, Massachusetts.¹ He was the son of John Fairfield III and Elizabeth Batson.² He married first Mary Emery, daughter of Rev. Samuel Emery and Tabitha Littlefield.^1,3 He married second Hannah Lovett, daughter of Simon Lovett and Annis (—?—) (Swetland-Lovett), after 1750.¹ His will was probated on 22 October 1778 in Arundel, York County, Maine.¹
     
     John's father died when he was a boy, and at about age 12, in 1718, his mother married at Cambridge, Dependence Littlefield. The Littlefields were among the founders of Wells, York County, Maine, and apparently John moved with his mother and stepfather to that area following the marriage.⁴

     John Fairfield witnessed deeds in Wells in 1722 and 1725, bought 300 acres in Arundel in 1726, and bought part of the mill privileges at the falls in 1727. He was made a proprietor in 1728, and had the second most honorable "pue" costing £13 assigned in Arundel Church in 1730. He bought all rights of "our grandfather John Batson in Arundel" in 1732. He was licensed to keep a tavern in 1734.⁴

     John Fairfield was first lieutenant in Capt. John Storer's Company under Sir William Pepperell at the capture of of Louisburg in 1745,⁵ and captain of the Arundel Company in the 1^st York County Regiment, Sir William Pepperell, Colonel, in which his sons John and Stephen also served, in 1757.¹ In 1764, he removed to Cape Porpus and bought "the farm now belonging to the heirs of William Fairfield."⁴

     The statement that John IV moved from Arundel to Cape Porpus is somewhat of a puzzlement since they are the same settlement known at various times as Cape Porpus, Cape Porpoise, Arundel, and since 1821, Kennebunkport. The logical explanation is that the locals in 1837, when Bradbury wrote his History of Kennebunkport, still referred to that area of Arundel where John IV bought his farm as Cape Porpus.